Nobody told me about wind pack

V

Voyage86

Member
im a simple midwest boy who has only skied pow 2 times. last week i was in park city and we got about 5 inches of fresh. it was blissful surfing untill the third day when the pow got wind packed. to my Illinois eye it almost looked better than normal pow. so nice and smooth. but as soon as i dropped in i was fighting for my life, catching an edge every time i took a breath. so, for people who really aren’t familiar with variable snow, what other conditions may look great to the untrained eye but are actually pretty difficult?

(my little bro filming me had just took a spill, don’t mind the insane panting)

[video]https://www.newschoolers.com/videos/watch/1083886/trim-7FC58B84-BA47-4509-8BF8-F3DA9F54AC63-MOV[/video]

**This thread was edited on Dec 29th 2023 at 11:17:42am
 
14576244:Rock_Inhabitant said:
When it’s a little chundery bcuz of avalanches or a busy trail but it’s frozen and feels like skiing on gravel
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True even though I know, I'm still always taken by surprise how concrete-like avalanche snow is
 
I just hate hitting random ice sheets. Coming over a crest that’s been shaded from the sun. That sudden long ass slide. Always puckers the butthole.
 
14576258:Rock_Inhabitant said:
First and hopefully last time I ever hear someone say this
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If you’ve never had a puckered butthole you ain’t livin.

[video]https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=OkKErpgdtUE[/video]
 
I once blasted into avalanche wash on A zone at meadows and died

14576244:Rock_Inhabitant said:
When it’s a little chundery bcuz of avalanches or a busy trail but it’s frozen and feels like skiing on gravel
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i always feel bad for people whose first soft snow is shallow angle, wet pow, maybe in the woods or a park. they can barely move and turn and they go, wtf are people so hyped on pow for? when really it's nothing like the real thing

gotta have speed even for nice light powder, to find the rhythm of the different style of turn. it's crazy how different it is from packed snow
 
sometimes man-made snow still in the form of whales will be super fun and chalky, the surface is just a clean white sheet, almost like powder. but it could be icy as well. otherwise i can't really think of any illusive snow conditions, most bad ones seem obvious, ice (in general, bluish hue or those frozen groomer tracks), cookies, etc.
 
14576338:CoolChillGuy420 said:
Wind-buff and chalky turns on some steeps absolutely rules. Just blasting fins every turn.
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idk man, this stuff ate my skis up. felt like i got trapped in it and couldn’t rotate without serious effort.
 
That sounds like a breakable wind crust. There are a few different techniques you could try, such as “porpoising”.

Firm windboard that is smoothed over but still grippy can be fun to ski
 
14576350:Voyage86 said:
idk man, this stuff ate my skis up. felt like i got trapped in it and couldn’t rotate without serious effort.
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More or less you gotta make smaller turns. More bending of the knees, and actually relying on the pole plant as this stuff can be harder to move through. Be a bit more surfy too.
 
14576253:ReturnToMonkey said:
True even though I know, I'm still always taken by surprise how concrete-like avalanche snow is
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Yeah an avalanche takes all of the air out of the snow. That's why if you're buried, you need to move your arms and legs to make the biggest space possible immediately when the snow stops moving giving yourself an air pocket (if you're conscious).
 
the snow is like this because the wind is breaking down the snow flakes shape so instead of being a flake ❄️ that has a lot of space in it, it breakdown into smalles grains and because incredibly dense and heavy. because of this, it wind loaded areas present a larger likelihood of causing a weak layer below fail and causing an avalanche. that shit is extremely heavy snow because the force of the avalanche is even greater than the wind and compacting the snow even more.
 
Cascade Chicken Heads is probably the worst ski conditions I’ve ridden

1083986.jpeg

1083987.jpeg

For you mid west boys this is what it looks like. During storms in the high alpine rime ice coats the windward side of the mountain
 
14576389:skiP.E.I. said:
Yeah an avalanche takes all of the air out of the snow. That's why if you're buried, you need to move your arms and legs to make the biggest space possible immediately when the snow stops moving giving yourself an air pocket (if you're conscious).
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The friction in the snow is enough to warm the snow up until it becomes a near slush. Then once the pack stops, everything freezes in place.

My area gets flooded with the dumbest tourists. Quite a few truly believe BC is nothing but poorboyz production-heavy-dubstep-neck-deep- cold-dry all day type conditions only to find its 70% shitfuck, cloudy and foggy with chances of ice rain.

OP, you should feel what wind hammered conditions are like. Its like skiing styrofoam with breakthrough patches that breaks skis!
 
14576389:skiP.E.I. said:
Yeah an avalanche takes all of the air out of the snow. That's why if you're buried, you need to move your arms and legs to make the biggest space possible immediately when the snow stops moving giving yourself an air pocket (if you're conscious).
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this is true but not really the reason. it's more because the friction of the moving snow melts it and then it refreezes hard when it stops moving
 
14576577:freestyler540 said:
The friction in the snow is enough to warm the snow up until it becomes a near slush. Then once the pack stops, everything freezes in place.

My area gets flooded with the dumbest tourists. Quite a few truly believe BC is nothing but poorboyz production-heavy-dubstep-neck-deep- cold-dry all day type conditions only to find its 70% shitfuck, cloudy and foggy with chances of ice rain.

OP, you should feel what wind hammered conditions are like. Its like skiing styrofoam with breakthrough patches that breaks skis!
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ahhhhhhh shit
 
I think the one that beats em all is when the snow is super wet from either rain and/or warm weather the night before, the groomers groom overnight, and then the snow freezes as corduroy. Even worse when all that happens and you get freezing rain on top. No conditions are unskiable for me but that shit is definitely damn close.
 
14576669:weastcoat said:
I think the one that beats em all is when the snow is super wet from either rain and/or warm weather the night before, the groomers groom overnight, and then the snow freezes as corduroy. Even worse when all that happens and you get freezing rain on top. No conditions are unskiable for me but that shit is definitely damn close.
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Cries in Mt Hood.
 
Tokyo drift down palmer....

14576669:weastcoat said:
I think the one that beats em all is when the snow is super wet from either rain and/or warm weather the night before, the groomers groom overnight, and then the snow freezes as corduroy. Even worse when all that happens and you get freezing rain on top. No conditions are unskiable for me but that shit is definitely damn close.
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14578616:OregonDead said:
it's like when are they going to open the summit and you finally get to the top it's like why did I go to the summit
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Nah dude it's just "variable" up there
 
Worst I’ve ever skied was Australia wet pow. It hits a point where it’s mostly water but it’s still snowing and not melting. Turns into skiing in like water with a zipper noise and friction. It just stops you. Not like Sierra concrete but like a puddle that is still snow. Very hard to explain. I never experienced anything like it in Tahoe.

14576508:mrk127 said:
Cascade Chicken Heads is probably the worst ski conditions I’ve ridden

View attachment 1083986

View attachment 1083987

For you mid west boys this is what it looks like. During storms in the high alpine rime ice coats the windward side of the mountain
Click to expand...
 
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